This past weekend we did a test stream of our church services at The Church Alive using Ustream.tv and I couldn’t get over how impressive this service is. We have made a few attempts in the past to stream using this service but have struggled because we didn’t have enough bandwidth on the upstream to carry this out. Our upstream from our ISP initially was about 300kbps at best and this past week we had them up our allocation to where we now have 700kbps upstream.
The video setup we are using is a homespun solution, we basically have a Windows XP machine setup to connect to a Canon USB Streaming camera that is plugged into our mixer board that has a t-bar setup on it. It’s actually a very decent setup with 2 cameras that pan to cover our pastor and worship team on the stage. With the addition of the control board we now have announcements that run on the screen as well as part of the feed.
We practiced streaming at around 14 bitrate and our video settings were at 80. This we figured out through trial and error would allow us to have pretty nice resolution without a lot of pixelation around the speakers face. The reason we have been testing this so frequently is because we want to stream an upcoming conference we have going on this next weekend. This should be the ultimate test for us. I expect to have about 200 people online viewing the conference!
If you have considered streaming your events online I strongly recommend Ustream over it’s competitor Mogulus, but that’s just me. I know some people who have used Mogulus and really like it. Here’s some info on Ustream:
Ustream.TV is the live interactive video broadcast platform that enables anyone with a camera and an Internet connection to quickly and easily broadcast to a global audience of unlimited size. In less than two minutes, anyone can become a broadcaster by creating their own channel on Ustream or by broadcasting through their own site, empowering them to engage with their audience and further build their brand. Click here to start a broadcast now or learn more about broadcasting.
Ustream’s one-to-many live interactive video encourages broadcast-to-viewer and viewer-to-viewer interaction, empowering a much more engaging experience for everyone involved.
With Ustream’s interactive broadcast functionality, viewers can personally interact directly with whoever is broadcasting — including personalities like their favorite musician or politician. Ustream viewers can watch specific broadcasts, explore our networks ranging from music, talk shows, sports and politics to discover a world of interesting new broadcasts, or review our past broadcasts.
Ustream opens up a new world of possibilities and experiences to broadcasters and viewers alike, which the pre-recorded static video that’s predominated the Internet to date just can’t provide. Today, people are Ustreaming everything including:
- Major political events such as debates, speeches, rallies
- Talk shows
- Entertainment events such as premieres and ‘red carpet events’
- Music showcases of their favorite music, of their own band’s performances, and live jam sessions
- Conference sessions
- School and business events and training
- Sporting events at college and high school level
- Personal milestones such as holiday gatherings, weddings, grade school events, parties, even births
- Interactive games for viewers to watch or join
Ustream.TV: About Us. The company, founders, Broadcasters. John Ham, Brad Hunstable, Dr. Gyula Feher. Investors, Venture Partners, DCM, Western Technology
Questions or Comments?